The Disney Pixar vision of cars is finally in the pipeline to come to life. Toyota has recently previewed it’s Camatte concept car, which looks a lot more like the newest character from an animated movie than a road ready car. The concept was developed to attract the growing younger market of drivers. As budgets shrink and fuel costs rise many youths have been skipping the age old tradition of learning to drive all together. Camatte interests me for reasons fairly removed from their intended purpose. This sort of car would be very well suited to drivers in small suburban and semi-rural areas who need to drive fewer than 100 miles per week. Perfect for trips back and forth to the farmer’s market or the zipping to the local coffee shop.
Didn’t make Citroën a sort of similar car back in the forties? You know the one that became widely popular and sold 3.8 million in 42 years?
Yes, I believe it was the Citroën 2CV. My favorite part of the Camatte Concept is that it is rumored to be 100% electric, and at it’s size and weight specs. it’s efficiency would be amazing.
I’ll take one!
I want.
“This sort of car would be very well suited to drivers in small suburban and semi-rural areas who need to drive fewer than 100 miles per week. Perfect for trips back and forth to the farmer’s market or the zipping to the local coffee shop.”
You know what would work better? A bicycle.
Mike, I could not agree with you more. At least this could be a step in the right direction for those people who are still unwilling to ditch the car completely.
Thank-you for comment, and readership!
Too bad you can’t open the ‘door’ in the rain…
Fair point, I think I would be ok with the sacrifice.
I would buy one but I am a.. portly gentleman and I doubt Id fit in the thing
I am reminded of an Onion article from some years back. The premise of the article was that one of the Big 3 automakers (Ford?) had come out with a disposable car. It was called the Whim, came with a full tank of gas and was designed to be thrown away when empty (instead of a gas gauge, it had an indicator that went from “new” to “old”). The Whim looked almost exactly like the Camatte – a little wee thing like an almost-grownup version of a toddler’s pedal car. I think if young people are making a decision to leave cars out of their lives, that’s not a problem that needs solving. I think that the current young generation and those that follow will come to look at cars – fossil-fuel ones, anyway – as “things that previous generations owned but we don’t, like horses or slaves”, and trying to lasso these guys into buying a car is like trying to sell a veggie-leather buggy whip with an anodized aluminum handle to the new, savvy hipster generation of coach-and-four drivers. Of course, in the interest of full disclosure, I must admit that if they came out with a Streamline Moderne version of this thing I’d probably drown in my own drool.
Visited a microcar museum this weekend and saw a lot of cars this size and very similar to the second car featured. http://missannethropesblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/mini-car-museum.html
That is a reasonable concern, but I think the 1 and 2 seat configuration would make it more possible than if they had tried to cram 2 seats up front.
Great comparison, I believe it is rumored that the Camatte will be 100% batter powered electric. So that will be a nice shift away from the fossil-fuels.
I imagine, with it’s size, it would also make a great city-parking car.
But, more interestingly, the little green knobs all over the car suggest to me an intention for lots of customization. I just wish there was more information up about it.
I want one, excellent packaging for me & my new waffle iron, but can I put my bike rack on it? Are they being manufactured presently?
I thought of you when I came across it. I am sure we could get it outfitted for a bike rack.
They are not in production yet, still just a concept. Fingers crossed that they will hit the market in the next few years.